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Jun 12

An Internet Marketer’s View On 3 Over-Hyped Website Trends.

By Internet marketing, Marketing Tips, Website Design

The website industry is ever-evolving. As trends come and go, web masters will jump onto new developments and stick to them for various reasons. Some are intrigued by the ingenuity, some the practicality, and some the performance. As a result many ideas that become staples in professional web design will turn away users who aren’t interested in the industry on a professional level.

Below are 3 popular trends you have probably seen that turn visitors off and can hinder the performance of your website.

1. Sliders Or Slideshows

The tried and true image slider is one of the most commonly used features on home pages across the web.

Why Web Designers Love Them:

The image slider allows a designer to display multiple products and/or messages in one location. If your business offers three main services a designer goes to the logical solution of making one slide for each service and rotating them indefinitely. This will ensure users get equal exposure to each service.

Why Your Users Hate Them:

Read More

May 21

10 (Slightly Late) Internet Marketing Trends For 2015

By Internet marketing

Yeah I know what you’re thinking. It’s May. Aren’t you little late with your 2015 predictions? Well maybe but…

1) we like to be different and thought we’d avoid the flood of posts at the new year and…

2) we thought we’d be more accurate this way.

So again this year, back in January, we gathered four passionate internet marketing consultants at our favourite hangout across from the Marketing Garage so that we could present you our 10 top internet marketing trends for 2015.

Around the table were:

  • Bob Nunn, Internet Marketing Consultant and co-founder of The Marketing Garage
  • Matt Colangelo, Digital Marketing Consultant and owner of his local search firm
  • Mike Granger, Pay-per-click Marketing Consultant
  • Skylar Burns, Website Mechanic

Read More

May 08

How Do Hashtags Work & 3 Tips To Make Them Work

By Social Media Marketing

Everyone wants to know about the telephone button (#) that has now become a social media phenomenon. Whether you love or hate them, they seem to be everywhere and everyone is using them. As a marketing consultant who specializing in social media marketing I like to determine what’s working and what’s not. So do hashtags work or is it just a myth like “warming up an engine before driving”. Are people just using hashtags because it’s a popular thing to do these days, do they actually work, or are they just #Annoying?

Digital marketing agency - Do Hashtags Work

As it turns out, they work! Here is a breakdown of how do hashtags work and 3 tips on how to make them work.

How Do Hashtags Work?

Hashtags originated on twitter but have now spread to most major social media platforms, including but not limited to Facebook, Instagram, Google+, and Pinterest. Hashtags work 3 ways to:

  1. Categorize Content to get found easily
  2. Build a following
  3. Promote Events

Read More

Dec 23

Conversions VS ROI: 4 Tips When Evaluating PPC Internet Marketing

By Internet marketing

Are you running a pay-per-click campaign and have questions about whether or not it’s working? When clients ask me how to evaluate a PPC campaign, I generally give the conversion rate as the short answer. For most clients nothing is more important than generating sales or leads. Although using this rate as the sole indicator of performance makes sense in theory, PPC account managers and clients would be making a mistake by ignoring other performance indicators. Here are the 4 reasons the conversion rate shouldn’t be the only way performance is evaluated.

4 Reasons Conversion Rates Don’t Tell the Whole Picture

1.   Not All Sites Can Accurately Track Conversions

Not all websites have the functionality to properly track conversions. Some websites have constraining content management systems or lack a webmaster with the ability to add tracking code to buttons or thank you pages. When a website has a limited ability to track conversions it may be more effective to focus on the behavior of the paid visitors such as the average time spent on a page, or as I outlined in a recent blog post; the click-through-rate of the pay-per-click campaign itself.

2.   The Majority Of Conversions That Begin Online, Finish Offline

Consumers don’t always finish the entire conversion process online. Site visitors may instead decide to convert offline via phone call or by visiting the business in person. Google found that as many as 80% of shoppers will research online before making a purchase, however only 44% will finish the entire process online. Additionally, Read More

Dec 02

4 Reasons the Click-Through-Rate Matters in PPC Internet Marketing

By Internet marketing

How do you know your pay-per-click campaign is paying off? And what should you be looking for when evaluating a PPC campaign? When I ask new PPC clients this question, many focus solely on a low cost-per-click or the number of valuable conversions such as purchases, and form completions. And at the end of the day they would be right to an extent. Nothing matters more than visitors taking valuable actions on your website at an efficient cost.

However these measures can’t be relied on to tell the whole picture. PPC account managers would be making a big mistake by ignoring other important factors such as the click-through-rate (CTR).

What is a Click-Through-Rate?

The click-through-rate is a measure of how frequently an ad is clicked compared to how often it is seen. The CTR is calculated by:

CTR Formula For Internet Marketing

Average click-through-rates vary greatly by industry, targeted geography, and competition. According to Google, the average industry CTR is between 1-2%.

Why Do Click-Through-Rates Matter for PPC?

In Google Adwords click-through-rates matter for 4 main reasons; the CTR is an indicator of strength of messaging, accurate targeting, can assist in guessing offline conversions, and maintaining a high CTR results in cheaper clicks.

1.   CTRs Can Indicate Strong and Weak Messaging

Click-through-rates are useful in understanding how strong your advertising message is. Since CTRs are calculated by the frequency an ad is clicked when seen, it’s clear that ads featuring more enticing messaging will be clicked more frequently. This can be an especially useful tool when trying to understand what messages actually matter to your audience (You may be surprised!).

2.   High CTRs Signify Accurate Targeting

The stronger your message is, the more frequently it will be clicked when seen. However, what happens if the audience you’re targeting is too wide? No matter how strong your message is, if it is being seen by the wrong audience it will receive a low CTR.

Read More

Oct 30

2 Points On The Impact Of Internet Marketing On Elections

By Internet marketing

This blog post will share insight from a wee bit of data on local elections underscoring the importance of having an online presence in getting you and your product elected and, secondly, using online testing to make sure you’re saying something interesting with your traditional media spend.

No Internet Marketing = Less Chance of Victory

Being a good democratic citizen, I voted in the municipal election of our little town north of Toronto on Monday. Sadly, it wasn’t easy. We had to choose one of two candidates for mayor. That was easy. (No Rob Ford to consider here : ) But then I had to pick eight town councilors out of 28 candidates! I’m sure like many people I could come up with two, three or four but eight!? That was tough. And, naturally I wanted to make an informed voting decision. So before I headed off to the voters booth, I did what hordes of consumers do when they’re trying to make a more informed buying decisions these days, I turned to the internet. I wasn’t alone. Here’s the search volume for the term ‘municipal election’ in Ontario using Google Trends. Internet searches municipal elections My town didn’t make it easy to find a list of candidates but I persisted and found a list. Then checked which had websites, read about them, got to know them a bit and went off and made my-now-informed voting decision. Done! I checked out the results in the morning but then, because I’m a curious data-driven internet marketing consultant, I correlated the results with own my experience as a voter / consumer. That’s where it got interesting: There were 6 incumbents and 22 new candidates vying for those 8 spots. Of those 22 new candidates 15 had websites. Amazingly in this day & age. 7 – or almost one-third! –  did not have a website or any other internet marketing. How was I – or you? – to make an informed buying decision without a website to learn about them and their views. From the flyers sent in the mail? Obviously that’s a good way to reach some folks but for me – and most consumers these days – sorry that literature went straight to the trash with the other junk mail. 5 of the 6 incumbent candidates were re-elected. 3 new candidates were also elected. All three of those new candidates had websites and other internet marketing including banners on local news sites. How did the seven who did not have sites do? Read More

May 22

Welcome to The Marketing Garage

By Branding No Comments

We put a new fascia on a Toronto area marketing company today. The Marketing Garage is based just north of Toronto in the lovely town of Aurora. It’s been co-founded by Brian Larter, of the long-standing Aurora ad agency Larter Marketing & Communications and Bob Nunn, founder of the internet marketing consultancy Brand Mechanics.

Toronto-Marketing-Company-Signage

Together, they’ve been instrumental in the success of an impressive roster of blue-chip clients including Harley-Davidson, 3M, Unilock, M&M Meat Shops, AutoTrader and more. Along the way, they’ve won over 40 marketing awards from everyone from the Canadian Marketing Association to Cannes. With a core set of beliefs that are almost identical, their two roads – branding and internet diagnostics – have intersected at precisely the right moment in time.

So what do you do?

We help companies tune-up their marketing for the online era. With a series of proven diagnostic processes that use over 90 benchmarks and 25 tools we do a bumper-to-bumper evaluation to assess your online and offline marketing performance and identify the quickest opportunities for improvement. After the initial pop of the hood, we get to work fixing the problems. With our unique business model (more about that later) we have a full set of tools including but not limited to:

  • SEO: Our proven process gets you found for keywords that convert.
  • Social Media Marketing: Our results-driven strategies deliver more than just likes.
  • Pay-Per-Click: Our 22-point checklist achieves a click-thru that’s 3X the industry average.
  • Conversion Optimization: Our tools & audits identify the fixes needed to make your site sell.
  • Branding: Our award-winning Brand Engineering process takes the guesswork out.
  • Video Marketing: Videos that not only make you go “wow” but get found, viewed & shared.

Along the way, we provide coaching for your team to help them take your marketing into the digital revolution with confidence.

Who are you for?Toronto-Marketing-Company-Marketing

We’re for clients who believe that all marketing is measurable.  For those who are a little tired of marketing programs that failed to move the needle and don’t really think advertising should be a faith-based initiative. We’re for companies who may not know what’s working and what’s not working but need someone who can cut to the chase using ruthless analytics that sometimes challenge the status quo. We’re for people who want quick wins and believe in keeping the best and fixing the rest. We’re for companies who suspect that the future of marketing is both on and offline but appreciate that this new era of marketing measurement provides the absolute clarity needed to fuel business growth.

What have you been up to?

We’ve been busy merging the time-honoured principles of brand-building with the latest in online testing & learning. Recent client successes include:

  • Tripling site traffic for a recruitment firm as they enter year two of our Tune-Up program
  • Taking Pay-Per-Click Conversion from 2% to the low teens for a healthcare marketer
  • Re-branding York Region’s Pathways to 360 kids “Surrounding kids in crisis with care”
  • Creating a blog post that got shared over 1,200 times & saw the blog account for 15% of traffic
  • Launched a TV campaign that increased likelihood to book by 12% points for a travel client

Next

We’ll be re-doing our own site (see Shoemaker’s children) while maintaining our own top search engine rankings. You? Well if your brand is out of gas or your marketing needs a kick start to get it roaring down the information highway, just give us a call.

Toronto-Marketing-Company-Building

We’d love to hear about your business.

Oct 24

Searching for an Internet Marketing Job in the Toronto Area?

By Internet marketing No Comments

The Marketing Garage is a new marketing firm founded by industry veterans Bob Nunn and Brian Larter. It combines two existing businesses, Larter Marketing and Brand Mechanics. Based in Aurora, just north of Toronto, we provide online marketing strategies that move the needle. Our audits help our clients get more for their marketing money by uncovering the quick wins that get them fame, found and fans online. We pop the hood on their online marketing and then use over 90 marketing tools, best practices and checklists to combine the best of online marketing with an award-winning history of building strong, sustainable brands for the likes of Auto Trader, Harley-Davidson, Future Shop and more. The Marketing Garage is also an entirely new approach to the old ad agency model in that it’s a collective (or ‘guild’ as we call it) of independent experts in 7 different but complementary disciplines working under one roof (aka ‘The Garage’).

Aurora, Ontario; home of The Marketing Garage

 

We’re Hiring!

We’re looking to hire a ‘junior brand mechanic’. Someone who will join us in this unique venture and help us build on the clients and process we’ve created so far. We’re looking for a technical person who has a marketing view on life or a marketer with a deep technical side, love of analysis and metrics. You’ll be working directly with clients and have a diverse range of activities in this energetic, free-flowing environment. You’ll be a problem detective searching for that opportunity to take client’s internet marketing to a new level.

 

Position: Entry Level SEO / Internet Marketer:

‘Junior Brand Mechanic’*

 

Job Responsibilities

  • Implement and manage SEO, PPC and Online Marketing Campaigns

  • Analyze web analytics / metrics through various tools to Read More

Jun 02

TICO, The Travel Industry Council of Ontario, Asks The Marketing Garage To Go Wild!

By Video Production No Comments

We’ve been busy at Brand Mechanics launching a new business partnership with Toronto-area marketing company, Larter Marketing. The new business, dubbed The Marketing Garage (hey, where else would brand mechanics work?) is the combination of veteran marketing consultants Brian Larter and Bob Nunn.

The first TV commercial to come out of the new business is for the Travel Industry Council of Ontario (TICO).

The Marketing Garage has been working with TICO with a mandate to help create and increase overall consumer awareness. Over the past few years website traffic has increased 540%, now averaging over 200,000 visitors annually, while the annual Omnibus Research Survey has shown a steady increase in Consumer awareness and understanding of the functions of TICO over the past few years.

For more information on the TICO spot or working with The Marketing Garage contact: Brian Larter @416-721-9500 bwlarter@larter.ca

Bob Nunn is an award winning internet marketing consultant based in Toronto passionate about getting brands tuned up for the online era. He is the founder of BrandMechanics.ca and a regular speaker and guest blogger. Contact us to have us pop the hood on your internet marketing performance.

Jun 28

Looking for a Great Toronto Internet Marketing Job?

By Internet marketing No Comments

 

Brand Mechanics is a new 2 year old marketing firm founded by industry veterans Bob Nunn and Brian Larter. Based in Aurora, just north of Toronto, we improve the marketing performance of our clients by taking a diagnostic approach to their internet marketing. We use over 90 internet marketing tools, best practices and checklists to combine the best of online metrics with an award-winning history of building strong, sustainable brands for clients such as Future Shop, Harley-Davidson and Auto Trader amongst others. Brand Mechanics is also an entirely new approach to the old ad agency model in that it’s a collective of independent experts in 7 different but complementary disciplines working under one roof (aka ‘The Garage’).

Brand-Mechanics-Internet-Marketing-Building

The Larter building in Aurora, Ontario; home of Brand Mechanics internet marketing

We’re Hiring!

We’re looking to hire a ‘junior mechanic’. Someone who will join us in this unique venture and help us build on the clients and process we’ve created so far. We’re looking for a technical person who has a marketing view on life or a marketer with a deep technical side, love of analysis and metrics. You’ll be working directly with clients and have a diverse range of activities in this energetic, free-flowing environment but you’ll also play a key role on the team on the technical side. You’ll be a problem detective searching Read More

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